The Keeper

Jonah shifted in his saddle, Bandit's easy stride rocking beneath him. The late afternoon sun lay warm and golden across the fields, catching on corn gone dry at the stalk and maples beginning to burn red along the fence lines. Harvest had the whole countryside stirring; wagons creaked along distant lanes, smoke curled from somebody's burn pile, and every few miles another farmhouse sat tucked among its barns and windbreaks.

Jonah was in no hurry. Town was behind him, home was a few miles ahead, and Bandit knew the road well enough that the reins hung loose between Jonah's fingers.

The Mayfield place came into view around the next bend, its farmhouse set well back from the road beyond acres of pumpkins.

Bandit saw the scarecrow before Jonah did. His ears flicked forward. His stride shortened.

"Easy."

The gelding skittered sideways when they drew level with the field, no more than half a step before Jonah gathered the reins and settled a hand against his neck.

"Come on. You know better."

Bandit snorted, eye fixed on the figure standing a few rows deep into the pumpkins.

Jonah looked over despite himself.

Same old thing. Crossed timber, straw-stuffed clothes, battered hat. Nothing there that hadn't been there yesterday, or the day before that.

Still gave him the creeps.

"Yeah," Jonah murmured, scratching Bandit beneath the mane as the gelding hurried them past. "Me too, buddy."

There wasn't much waiting for Jonah when he got home.

There hadn't been for years.

The house had belonged to his great-grandfather once, along with nearly two hundred acres stretching from the road clear back to the creek. Some had gone to an uncle. Some had been sold when his grandfather needed the money. The rest had disappeared a field at a time until all Jonah had inherited was the old farmhouse, a weathered barn, and enough pasture to keep Bandit fed.

His brother called staying stubbornness, Jonah preferred tradition.

There was always work if you knew who to ask. The Harkers needed help bringing cattle down from their summer pasture. Old Mr. Bell paid Jonah to mend the north fence every spring, despite the fact that Jonah had told him three years running the whole damned thing needed replacing. Come haying, harvest, calving, or any other season when there was more work than hands, somebody always had a place for him.

Jonah liked it that way.

He worked where he was needed, ate supper wherever he happened to finish late enough that somebody's wife took pity on him, and rode home to his own bed at the end of it.

Everybody knew Jonah. Nobody particularly needed to know where he was.

It was a quiet life, but he didn't mind it.

A few days later found him back in town, standing in front of a shelf of liquor and debating whether the extra two dollars for the second-cheapest whiskey could reasonably be called an investment.

He decided it could not.

"Still drinking that?"

Jonah looked over. Ada Mayfield stood beside him with a bottle tucked against her hip, one eyebrow raised at his selection.

He glanced down at the label in his hand. "Never done me wrong."

"I'm fairly certain I saw my father use that to strip paint once."

"Multipurpose."

She laughed.

Jonah had to look slightly down at her, though not by much. Ada had always been lean, all wiry strength from a lifetime of farm work, with dark brown hair she wore tied back more often than not. Summer had browned her cheeks and scattered freckles across her nose.

More freckles than he remembered.

Jonah dropped his attention to his bottle before the observation became a stare. He grinned. "Well, look at you."

"What?"

"Nothing." He reached over and turned the bottle tucked against her hip enough to see the label. "Just didn't realize corn paid that well."

"It does when you don't spend all your money on horses."

"Bandit is an investment."

"Bandit is spoiled rotten," she said, plainly delighted to have found something else to give him trouble over.

"He works hard," Jonah protested.

"He tried to bite me last harvest."

"He has excellent judgment."

Ada's eyebrows climbed. Her mouth flattened into a look of such profound disapproval that Jonah nearly broke. He held out for another second before she laughed again.

He'd known Ada Mayfield most of his life, in the way everybody around here knew everybody. They'd been children in the same schoolhouse, teenagers at the same harvest suppers, adults working opposite ends of the same fields. Jonah had even hired on at the Mayfield place more than once when harvest came around and there weren't enough hands to bring everything in before the weather turned.

Somehow, though, he'd never noticed the little crease beside Ada's mouth when she smiled.

Ada tipped her head toward the bottle in his hand. "You know, if you're determined to poison yourself, you could at least buy something decent."

Jonah looked at her bottle, then his. "Some of us have budgets, Mayfield."

"Some of us have standards."

"Ouch."

"You'll survive."

"Not according to you."

Her mouth curved. Jonah's did the same.

Funny. He couldn't remember the last time talking to Ada Mayfield had felt quite like this.

###

After that, Jonah started seeing Ada everywhere.

Not that there were many places to see anybody. She waved when he passed the Mayfield place on his way to work and sometimes stopped him at the fence for a few minutes on his way home. Twice they happened to be in town at the same time. The second time, Jonah caught the look she gave him and informed her that, no, he was not following her.

Ada said she hadn't accused him of anything, though the fact that she was smiling made that difficult to believe.

Jonah found himself lingering anyway.

He'd never thought himself lonely. He had Bandit, plenty of work, and more neighbours than he could reasonably avoid when he went into town. But there was something different about knowing he might find Ada leaning against her fence when he came around the bend. Something pleasant about losing twenty minutes of daylight because she'd asked where he'd been working and somehow they'd ended up talking about everything else.

Even Bandit seemed to accept these delays, although his opinion of the Mayfield scarecrow remained unchanged.

One afternoon Jonah found half a dozen crows perched across its shoulders and outstretched arms. Another hopped along the brim of its battered hat before dipping its head to peck industriously at one its eyes.

Jonah chuckled. "Well, that's you out of a job."

Bandit's ears pinned forward.

"Don't look at me like that. They're eating his face. I think you win."

The gelding remained unconvinced.

By October, autumn had settled in properly. The mornings came silver with frost, the trees along the roads had gone from green to rust and gold, and Jonah had taken to wearing his heavier coat when he rode out before sunrise. Harvest was well underway. Every field seemed to be changing by the day, tall crops disappearing into stubble and wagons rumbling toward barns and silos before the weather turned.

And somewhere along the way, seeing Ada had stopped being something that happened to Jonah and become something he made time for.

On Friday evening, he stood in front of the little mirror over his washbasin and ran a hand through his hair for the third time.

He frowned at himself.

It was only drinks.

He reached for the comb anyway. His good jeans came next. Good meaning they had neither holes nor permanent mud stains, which Jonah considered more than sufficient for an evening at the pub. He dug a button-up from the back of the wardrobe too, one of the few he owned that wasn't plaid, and stood for a moment wondering if that was enough.

His brother probably would have worn chinos. Jonah only knew what chinos were because Marshall owned half a dozen pairs and managed to work the word into conversation whenever he found the time to call.

Jeans were fine.

By the time Jonah stepped outside, his honey-blond hair had been bullied into something approaching order and his shirt was tucked in. He felt strangely put together.

Bandit lifted his head from the pasture as Jonah crossed the yard. "Don't start."

The gelding chewed.

Jonah pointed at him. "It's not a date."

The horse continued chewing.

"Drinks!"

Bandit snickered.

"You're a horse. What do you know?"

Jonah climbed into his truck and turned the key. The engine protested the indignity of being asked to do its job, coughed twice, then rumbled awake. He drove down the lane toward the Mayfield place.

The sun was already dipping below the horizon when he turned up her driveway. The noise of the engine sent a handful of crows flapping from the scarecrow, their black shapes scattering across the darkening sky.

Jonah shivered.

Most of the thing's eyes had been pecked away by now, leaving frayed stitches and little dark holes in the burlap. Somehow that hadn't improved matters. It still felt like the damn thing was staring at him. He shook off the feeling and followed the drive around to the house.

Ada was already waiting on the porch.

Jonah forgot about the scarecrow.

Amber light spilled down from above the door, catching warm against her skin and turning the loose fall of her dark hair almost copper at the edges. Her dress was blue, simple and fitted, ending just above her knees over a pair of brown ankle boots. There was something different about her face too. Nothing he could have named, exactly. Her lashes looked darker. Her lips softer. The freckles he'd noticed in town still showed across her cheeks.

Jonah sat behind the wheel for one beat too long.

Well, hell.

Ada smiled when she saw him.

That got him moving. He killed the engine and climbed out, suddenly acutely aware of his clean shirt, his combed hair, and the fact that he had spent the better part of ten minutes insisting to a horse that this wasn't a date.

"Hey," Ada called.

"Hey." Excellent start. Jonah rounded the hood as she came down the porch steps. "You look..."

Ada waited.

"Nice."

Her eyebrows rose.

"Really nice," he amended.

Her smile widened. "Careful, Jonah. You'll overwhelm me."

"I was getting there."

"Were you?"

"Yes." He reached the passenger side before her and pulled the door open. "You interrupted."

"Of course."

Ada stopped beside him, close enough that he caught some faint, unfamiliar scent beneath the clean autumn air. She looked up at him. "You look nice too."

"Oh."

Her lips twitched.

Jonah cleared his throat. "Thanks."

"Anytime."

She climbed into the truck before he could make things worse. Jonah closed the door and stood there for a second. Then he muttered, "Drinks," under his breath and went around to the driver's side.

For the first mile, he was painfully aware of Ada sitting beside him. Not doing anything. Just sitting there.

Jonah kept his eyes on the road.

"How'd it go with the Harkers?" Ada asked.

That helped. "Better than last year." He settled one arm along the back of the seat. "We got the whole herd down Thursday."

"No escapes?"

"Only two."

Ada laughed. "That's better?"

"You weren't there last year."

"How many?"

"Seven."

"Seven?"

"And a bull."

She turned toward him. "You lost a bull?"

"I didn't lose him. I knew exactly where he was."

"Which was?"

"About three miles from where he was supposed to be."

Ada laughed again, and some of the tightness finally went out of Jonah's shoulders.

"The bastard went straight through a fence," he continued. "Didn't even slow down. Harker's youngest tried to head him off on that little bay mare of theirs, which was about the stupidest thing he could've done."

"He's what, sixteen?"

"Seventeen now. Still thinks that makes him immortal."

"You didn't at seventeen?"

"Absolutely not."

Ada gave him a look.

Jonah glanced over. "I was a very sensible young man."

"Jonah."

"Fine. I was an idiot. But I was an idiot with excellent instincts."

"I'm sure."

"There was hardly ever permanent damage."

She laughed, and Jonah grinned.

There. This was easier.

By the time the lights of town appeared ahead, he'd stopped thinking about where to put his hands or whether his shirt looked all right. Ada had tucked one leg beneath the other and turned slightly toward him, and they were arguing over whether falling off a barn roof at fifteen counted as evidence of poor judgment if he'd landed in the haystack on purpose.

Jonah maintained that it did not.

The Bellweather Tavern, hardly creatively named, was Bellweather's only real establishment other than Mary's Diner. Mary didn't serve alcohol. Wicked good chilli, best coffee in town, but if you wanted to go out, you went to the Tavern.

Ada slipped her hand into the crook of Jonah's arm as they crossed the short distance from the truck to the front door.

He looked down at it. Only for a second. Then he opened the door for her.

"Thank you kindly," she said, dipping her head with a wide grin as she stepped through.

"My pleasure." That came out considerably smoother than hey had.

Inside was warm and pleasantly crowded, full of low conversation and the clink of glasses. Mr. Norris spotted them almost immediately.

He'd owned the Tavern for as long as Jonah could remember and looked as though he'd been standing behind its bar considerably longer than that. He was a broad old man gone soft around the middle, with thinning white hair combed neatly back and deep creases around eyes that always seemed on the verge of laughing.

Mr. Norris showed them to a booth tucked against the far wall, comfortably removed from the busier tables around the bar. Ada slid onto the bench and shrugged out of her coat while Jonah took the seat across from her.

He picked up the menu.

Ada smiled across the table. "Why are you even looking at that? You already know what you're getting."

Jonah looked over its edge. "Might've changed."

"You've ordered the same thing since you were seventeen."

He lowered the menu. "You keeping track?"

"Maybe." Ada rested her chin lightly against her hand.

Heat crept unexpectedly up the back of Jonah's neck.

Her smile grew. He retreated behind the menu. "Burger," he said.

"I'm shocked."

Mr. Norris returned before Jonah could formulate a suitable defence. Ada ordered a glass of red wine. Jonah asked for a beer, then endured another pointed look from her.

"What?"

"Nothing."

"That's twice you've said nothing like it means something," he said, fighting a smile.

Ada lifted both hands in innocent surrender. "I don't know what you're talking about."

Mr. Norris chuckled as he walked away.

Jonah narrowed his eyes after him. "He's enjoying this."

"So am I."

His attention came back to her. Ada was looking at him over the little candle burning between them, amusement still lingering around her mouth.

Something warm shifted low in Jonah's stomach. He cleared his throat. "Yeah?"

"Yeah." She leaned back against the booth. "You clean up all right, Jonah."

"Thought we'd established that."

"We established that you looked nice." Her voice softened around the last word, and Jonah found himself suddenly unable to hold her gaze.

His eyes dropped instead.

To her mouth.

That was worse.

He dragged them back to the candle between them. "Different thing?"

"Very."

Before he could ask exactly how different, Mr. Norris returned with their drinks.

The first beer helped. Not enough to make Jonah drunk, or anything close to it. It simply quieted the part of his brain that had apparently decided every movement of Ada's mouth required his immediate attention.

Food came. Then another round.

Somewhere between stealing one of Ada's fries and discovering that she had very strong opinions about the correct way to stack hay, Jonah stopped remembering to be nervous. The Tavern grew busier around them. Someone fed coins into the jukebox. Mr. Norris passed their table twice to collect empty glasses, and each time Jonah was vaguely surprised by how much time had gone by.

Ada was easy to talk to. He'd known that already. He just hadn't realized how easy. By the time his second beer was half gone, a pleasant warmth had settled through him. Ada had kicked off one boot beneath the table and tucked her foot against his ankle. Jonah had shifted his leg to give her room.

At least, that was what he'd told himself. Then her toes traced lazily up the inside of his calf. Jonah lost the thread of what he was saying.

Ada's eyes sparkled. "And then?"

"And then what?"

"You were telling me about Bell's tractor."

"Right."

Her foot slid back down.

Jonah took a drink.

She was absolutely doing that on purpose. He couldn't bring himself to mind.

A few minutes later he made her laugh hard enough that she reached across the table and caught his forearm. Her fingers stayed there even after the laughter faded, warm through the rolled cuff of his shirt.

Jonah looked at her hand. Then back at her. Ada was still smiling.

God, he liked her smile.

Her eyes moved over his face. "You're blushing."

"I am not."

"You are a little."

"It's warm in here."

"Of course it is." Her thumb brushed once across his sleeve. "It's cute."

That certainly didn't help. Jonah smiled into his beer and decided he could live with that.

The song on the jukebox changed. Ada's fingers were still resting on his arm. They tapped once against his sleeve, keeping time. Then she said, "Ask me to dance, Jonah Reed."

He looked up. "What?"

"Ask me to dance."

Jonah glanced toward the open patch of floor beside the jukebox. He looked back at her. "Ada."

"What?"

"Nobody's dancing."

"I didn't ask what everybody else was doing." There was a challenge in the little lift of her eyebrows.

Jonah laughed under his breath. "You're serious."

"Very."

"You're trying to get me talked about."

"Oh, I think we're well past that."

His eyes flicked toward the bar. Mr. Norris immediately found something beneath the counter that required his full attention. "Traitor," Jonah muttered.

Ada laughed, and that warm little flush climbed Jonah's neck all over again.

Well, hell. Apparently he'd do quite a lot to hear that sound. Jonah shook his head, pushed himself out of the booth, and came around the table. Ada watched him approach with an expression altogether too pleased with herself.

He stopped beside her and offered his hand. "All right." He gave her his best approximation of a gentlemanly bow. "Ada Mayfield, would you like to dance?"

She slipped her hand into his. "I thought you'd never ask."

"You didn't exactly give me the chance."

Ada was already pulling him toward the jukebox. Jonah followed, painfully aware of the empty floor and determined not to look toward the bar again. "Just so we're clear, I don't dance."

"Everybody dances."

"Some shouldn't."

She stopped and turned toward him.

And suddenly the joke wasn't quite so funny anymore.

Jonah's hand settled cautiously at her waist. Ada stepped closer without hesitation, one hand slipping up onto his shoulder, the other still held in his.

Closer than they'd been all night.

Close enough that he could feel the warmth of her through his shirt.

"There," she murmured. "Terrifying."

Jonah looked down at her. "Little bit."

Ada smiled and drew him into the first slow step.

He was awkward for perhaps half a minute. Then Jonah discovered that dancing with Ada mostly consisted of keeping one hand at her waist, not stepping on her boots, and letting her guide him whenever he started thinking too hard about it.

He could manage that.

Especially when she moved closer.

Her arm eased farther around his shoulder. His hand shifted almost without thought from her waist to the small of her back. Ada's cheek brushed his jaw as she leaned in.

Jonah forgot entirely whether anyone was watching.

"See?" she murmured near his ear. "You're dancing."

"Don't tell anybody."

Her laugh was softer this time. He felt it against him. Jonah smiled.

When Ada drew back, she didn't go far. Her face was only inches from his.

For once, Jonah didn't look away.

Ada's gaze dropped briefly to his mouth.

That was all the help he needed. He bent toward her slowly, giving her every opportunity to change her mind.

She met him halfway.

The kiss was soft. Barely more than the warm press of her mouth against his, lingering just long enough for Jonah's fingers to tighten at her back.

When they parted, Ada stayed close.

Jonah swallowed. "Well."

Her smile appeared slowly. "Well?"

"I might be coming around on dancing."

Ada laughed and tucked herself against him again.

Jonah decided Mr. Norris could tell the whole damn town.

###

The truck doors slammed almost together.

Jonah came around the hood humming the last few bars of a song that had stopped playing sometime before they'd turned onto Ada's road. Ada picked it up badly, missed half the notes, and dissolved into laughter.

"You don't know the words."

"Neither do you."

"I know more than you."

"You've been making them up for ten minutes."

Ada caught his hand when he reached her and spun beneath his arm.

Jonah laughed. "What are you doing?"

"Dancing."

"We left the dancing back in town."

"Says who?" She came out of the turn still holding his hand, hair swinging loose around her shoulders. Jonah tugged her back toward him and she bumped laughing against his chest.

He kissed her.

There had been quite a lot of that since leaving the Tavern.

Ada's hands slid up around his neck. Jonah settled his at her waist and kissed her again, slower this time, until she smiled against his mouth.

"Come on," he murmured when they finally separated.

He kept her hand in his and started toward the porch.

Jonah's arm pulled straight between them.

He looked back.

She was smiling. Then she tugged.

Not toward the house.

Jonah glanced past her at the dark shape of it. "The barn?"

Ada walked backward a few steps, drawing him after her.

That look was back in her eyes.

"The barn," Jonah repeated, considerably less confused.

Ada bit back a smile. "Problem?"

He looked toward the farmhouse. Then at Ada. Then at the barn. "Nope."

Her laugh floated across the yard as she pulled him along.

Jonah followed willingly. He'd spent enough of his life in barns to know a little hay never hurt anybody.

They barely made it through the doors.

Ada caught the front of his shirt and pulled him down to her the moment they were inside. Jonah stumbled after her, laughing against her mouth as the door swung shut behind them.

"Hold on," Ada murmured.

Jonah kissed her again. She laughed and pushed lightly at his chest. "Jonah."

"What?"

"I can't see."

"Right." He let her go reluctantly.

Ada disappeared a few steps into the darkness, one hand feeling along the wall. There was a click, and a scattering of overhead bulbs flickered reluctantly to life. Not many. Just enough to wash the barn in a low amber glow.

Jonah blinked and looked around.

It was much as he remembered from working the Mayfield harvests. Tools hung along one wall above a scarred workbench, everything arranged with the practical neatness of things that actually got used. An old tractor sat half-disassembled in one corner, apparently still awaiting the miracle that would return it to service. The loft stretched overhead, its heavy beams disappearing into shadow above them.

And along the back wall sat several neat stacks of hay bales. Jonah's attention lingered there.

Ada came back to him.

"You planning something, Mayfield?"

She slipped her fingers between his. "Maybe."

Jonah grinned. This time, when she pulled him toward the hay, he didn't need any convincing. Ada backed into the nearest stack and caught him by the shirt. Jonah laughed as he stumbled against her. "You could ask."

"I did."

"When?"

"About five minutes ago."

"That wasn't asking."

She kissed him before he could continue the argument.

Jonah hands found her waist, then her back, drawing her closer as Ada's arms slipped around his neck. This was different from kissing her on the dance floor. Different from the stolen kisses in the truck on the way home. There was no table waiting for them, no road to watch, no Mr. Norris pretending very badly not to look.

Just Ada.

And the increasingly unavoidable fact that she'd brought him out here for a reason.

His heart gave a hard, nervous thump.

Ada must have felt something change in him. She drew back just enough to look at him. "What?"

"Nothing."

"Jonah."

He smiled, a little sheepishly. "It's been a while."

Ada tipped her head. "How long is a while?"

Jonah hesitated.

Her eyebrows rose.

"Well." He rubbed the back of his neck. "Depends what we're counting."

Ada went still for half a beat. "Oh."

"Yeah."

"Jonah Reed."

"Don't."

She bit back a smile. "I wasn't going to say anything."

"You absolutely were."

"I was going to ask."

"Worse."

That earned him a laugh.

Jonah shook his head. "I had a girlfriend back in high school. We fooled around some, but she wanted to wait for marriage." He shrugged. "I wasn't ready to get married."

Ada's teasing softened. "And since then?"

He gave her a pointed look.

"Really?"

"Don't sound so surprised."

"I am." She slid her hands slowly back around his neck. "You're handsome. You're sweet. You work harder than just about anybody I know." Her smile turned softer. "I'm surprised nobody's managed to pin you down yet."

Jonah's face warmed. "Yeah?"

"Yeah." Ada drew a little closer. "Lucky me."

That knocked some of the embarrassment clean out of him.

Jonah looked at her for a moment. Then he leaned down and kissed her.

Ada smiled against his mouth and kissed him harder. Jonah's hand slid to the nape of her neck, the other tightening at her waist, and somewhere between one breath and the next her fingers were working between them. He barely registered what she was doing until she pushed his shirt from his shoulders and the kiss broke with it.

They stood there breathing the same air, barely inches apart. Ada let her hands wander slowly over his bare chest, looking at him with such open appreciation that heat climbed straight up Jonah's neck.

No one had ever looked at him quite like that before.

Jonah swallowed.

His hands were still resting at her waist, and suddenly he was acutely aware of the thin blue dress beneath his palms. There wasn't another shirt beneath it. No buttons to work through one by one. Just one small fastening between here and—

His thoughts stumbled.

Ada was still looking at him like he was the remarkable one.

God.

Jonah couldn't understand that at all.

Her mouth twitched. "You know, it was something of a miracle I got this zipper up by myself."

Jonah blinked.

Ada turned, gathering her hair over one shoulder. She glanced back at him. "I'm afraid getting it down might require assistance."

A laugh escaped him, taking some of the nerves with it. "That so?"

"Terrible design."

"Tragic." Jonah smiled and reached for the zipper.

He caught the tiny pull between his fingers and drew it slowly down her back. The blue fabric loosened beneath his hand, parting inch by inch until his knuckles were following the warm line of bare skin beneath.

Jonah swallowed.

He eased the dress from her shoulders. Ada let it slip down her arms and over her hips, leaving black lace beneath and an uninterrupted sweep of bare back that Jonah had never seen before. His gaze followed the curve of her waist before catching, helplessly, lower.

Ada glanced over her shoulder.

Caught. Her smile turned coy. "While you're back there..."

Jonah dragged his eyes upward. "Hmm?"

She gathered her hair a little higher. "Those are notoriously difficult too."

His gaze found the clasp of her bra. "Oh."

Ada laughed softly.

Jonah stepped closer. His fingers brushed her back as he reached for it, and that tiny contact felt absurdly intimate. Skin that would ordinarily have been hidden beneath a shirt, beneath a dress, beneath all the ordinary boundaries that had existed between Ada Mayfield and Jonah Reed for as long as he'd known her.

His fingers settled at the clasp.

After that, things became considerably less orderly.

Ada turned into his arms before he'd quite finished, kissing him as clothing was shed and abandoned wherever it happened to fall. Somewhere along the way Jonah stopped worrying about what came next. There was only Ada's laughter between kisses, the warmth of her against him, and the dizzying realization that every time he reached for her, she reached just as eagerly for him.

By the time they tumbled laughing onto the hay, Jonah had completely lost track of where his pants had landed.

He couldn't bring himself to care.

Ada fell back into the hay and caught him by the shoulders, drawing him down with her. Jonah followed, bracing himself above her until she tugged him closer still.

The laughter faded.

For a moment neither of them moved.

They were naked now, pressed together from chest to thigh, Ada warm beneath him and Jonah suddenly, overwhelmingly aware that there was nothing left between them. Her hair had spilled loose through the hay. Her cheeks were flushed, her lips swollen from kissing him, and she was looking up at him with that same impossible expression she'd worn when she took off his shirt.

Like she couldn't believe her luck.

###

Cold woke him.

Jonah opened his eyes to the dim barn lights and lay there for a moment, fuzzy and uncomfortable, trying to remember why the hell he was sleeping in a barn.

Ada.

The Tavern. Dancing. Hay.

A sleepy smile almost found him. Christ. They'd actually fallen asleep out here.

Jonah tried to sit up.

Nothing happened.

He frowned and tried again.

Still nothing.

The last of sleep began to loosen its grip. His head felt thick from the beer, his mouth dry, and somewhere beneath all of that something small and unpleasant had begun scratching at the back of his mind.

Jonah tried to lift his hand.

He couldn't tell if he'd moved it.

His eyes darted downward. His arm lay exactly where it had been. His fingers tingled faintly. His toes too, distant prickles at the very edges of a body he suddenly couldn't seem to feel at all.

What the hell?

He tried to call for Ada, but his mouth wouldn't form the word.

That was when fear finally got through.

His eyes jerked around the barn. He could move those. Blink. Look. Everything else—nothing.

Footsteps sounded nearby and Ada came into view.

Jonah's eyes tracked her automatically as she approached, and for several strange seconds something about the angle bothered him. She looked too low. He was looking almost straight across at her rather than up from the floor.

His sluggish mind worried at that without understanding it.

Ada stopped beside him.

Beside him, not above him.

Jonah blinked.

A workbench.

He was lying on the damn workbench.

Panic detonated through him.

Move.

Every instinct in him fired at once. Sit up. Roll away. Kick. Grab her. Anything. Jonah threw everything he had into moving a single fucking muscle and his body answered with perfect, horrifying stillness.

His heart was hammering. He could hear it.

But he couldn't feel it.

Move!

Ada looked down at him, her face terribly familiar in the low amber light. The same freckles. The same dark hair. The same woman who had been laughing into his shoulder before he fell asleep.

Her expression was almost gentle. "Don't fight it."

Jonah's eyes snapped to hers.

"I know." Ada reached down and brushed a strand of hair back from his forehead. "It's frightening."

What did you do to me?

Whether she read the question in his eyes or simply expected it, her gaze softened. "Monkshood."

Her fingertip settled against his chest.

Jonah felt it. He felt every slow inch as she traced the line of one rib, the faint drag of her nail against his skin. His body didn't so much as twitch.

"My grandmother started cultivating this strain before I was born. Her mother grew another before that." Ada's finger wandered lower. "Grandmother was the clever one, though. Thirty-seven years selecting the right plants."

Jonah tried desperately to recoil from her touch.

Nothing moved.

That was worse. God, that was so much worse.

"It used to be rather dangerous." Ada's mouth curved faintly. "Still is, if you don't know what you're doing." Her hand flattened over his chest. Jonah felt the warmth of her palm. The slight pressure of each finger. Even the tiny shift of her skin as his chest rose beneath it. "You can breathe. You can see me. You can hear me. For now, you can blink." Her eyes lifted to his. "You can feel everything." Her thumb stroked once across his skin. "But you stay nice and still."

Jonah stared at her.

Ada gave him that same soft, familiar smile. "Clever, isn't it?"

She turned away. Jonah's eyes followed her to the workbench along the wall. Something had been laid out there. His stomach seemed to drop even though the rest of him remained perfectly still.

Tools.

Ada selected one. It looked like something that belonged in a butcher's shed: heavy-handled, broad-bladed, sharpened to a clean silver edge. She tested its weight in her hand with the absent familiarity of someone choosing the right tool for a job.

Panic surged through Jonah again. No.

Ada glanced back at him. "I know." She carried the blade over and set it beside his hip. The metal made a small, ordinary sound against the wood. "Grandmother's strain fixed nearly everything." Ada reached for a cloth and began wiping down the blade. "The older preparations were difficult to control. Sometimes the heart stopped. Sometimes the lungs did."

Jonah couldn't look away from the blade.

"It took her years to breed those problems out." Ada inspected the edge. "Sensation was the trade-off." Her mouth tightened, almost apologetically. "I'm sorry about that."

Something inside Jonah went cold.

Ada put down the cloth. "The old Keeper lasted eleven years." She spoke almost fondly now. "That's longer than most."

Keeper. Jonah's eyes snapped to her.

Ada noticed. "Yes." Her expression softened. "You've seen him."

The pumpkin patch. Crossed timber. Straw-stuffed clothes. Battered hat. Bandit skittering beneath him. Crows perched along outstretched arms. They're eating his face.

Jonah's pulse thundered in his ears.

"No Mayfield field goes without a Keeper." Ada rested one hand beside his shoulder. "Not since the first one."

His mind recoiled from the words.

One. Not it.

"The crows were the sign." She looked toward the barn doors, toward the fields beyond them. "Once they stop fearing him, it's time."

Jonah remembered laughing. I think you win.

Oh God.

Ada looked back down at him. "And I need another." Her fingers brushed gently through his hair. "You were always going to be perfect."

Ada's hand left his hair.

She reached for the blade.

No. No, no no— Jonah threw everything he had against the paralysis. His arms remained at his sides. His legs lay useless beneath him. He couldn't turn his head, couldn't scream, couldn't even drag in the breath his mind demanded.

Ada positioned the blade against the center of his chest.

Her eyes found his. "I'm sorry."

Then she pressed down.

Pain exploded through Jonah. His mind screamed where his body couldn't, every thought obliterated beneath one impossible line of agony as Ada drew the blade steadily downward. He tried to wrench away. Tried to curl around the hurt. Tried to do anything at all.

His body remained perfectly still.

Tears flooded his eyes.

Ada stopped. For one terrible second there was only Jonah's ragged breathing and the unbearable fact that he could feel exactly what she'd done.

Then Ada set the blade aside.

"I know," she whispered. Her hand came gently to his cheek. "I know."

Jonah stared at her through the tears. Then Ada reached for another tool.

His fear sharpened. This one wasn't made for flesh. Heavy iron jaws sat between long, worn wooden handles, the darkened metal polished bright only along its edges. It looked like something meant for pruning stubborn branches.

Ada tested the handles once. The jaws closed with a hard metallic snap.

Jonah couldn't tear his eyes from it.

Ada followed his gaze. "This part isn't pleasant."

Jonah's terror deepened. She was warning him.

The jaws disappeared below the edge of his vision. Pressure followed, deep and terrible, building until something gave beneath them. Pain flashed white behind his eyes.

Ada stopped only long enough to reposition the tool.

Again.

And again.

Jonah could see nothing but the measured pull of her shoulders, the strain tightening her jaw each time she bore down on the handles. She worked with the grim patience of someone pruning an overgrown hedge, moving steadily from one stubborn place to the next.

"Granddad used a saw," she said, a little breathless. "Took forever." Another burst of agony swallowed Jonah whole. "Dad made these for me."

By the time Ada finally straightened, Jonah was drowning in tears.

She laid the bloodied tool carefully beside the knife.

Then her hands returned to him.

Her fingers slipped into the wound.

Jonah's mind recoiled from the sensation. If he'd had control of his stomach, he would have been sick. He couldn't understand what she was doing, couldn't make what he felt fit inside anything his mind was willing to accept.

Ada planted her feet. Her shoulders tightened.

And pulled.

The sound swallowed everything. A wet, dragging tear came from somewhere impossibly close, followed by a succession of brittle cracks as whatever still held him together gave beneath Ada's hands. Each one seemed louder than the last.

Jonah heard nothing else. Only that terrible tearing. The sharp reports of something inside him breaking. And Ada's strained breathing above it all as his ribcage opened before him.

Then it stopped.

"There." Ada stepped back, breathing hard. She pushed a loose strand of hair from her forehead with the back of her wrist and let out a long breath. A dark smear followed the motion, streaking from her temple into her hairline.

Jonah couldn't stop looking at it.

His blood.

Ada wiped her hands carefully on her apron, leaving dark streaks across the fabric, then came back to his head.

"Oh, honey." Her voice softened. She brushed the tears from his cheek with clean fingers. "I know. I'm sorry." Her thumb moved gently beneath his eye. "Mother always said it was kinder to get that part over with quickly."

Kinder. Jonah stared up at her. The streak along her temple had already begun to dry.

Ada gave him a small, reassuring smile. "See? It's done now." Her fingers moved through his hair. "The worst part's over."

Then she walked away.

Jonah's eyes followed her as she began gathering things from around the barn. A metal bucket came first. She set it beside the workbench. Then a pair of short, heavy shears. A roll of coarse thread. Something else wrapped neatly in cloth. Jonah watched without understanding.

Ada disappeared from view again. When she returned carrying a wooden stool, she placed it beside him and sat down, settling her apron over her knees as she made herself comfortable. "This takes a little while," she said.

Her hand disappeared below the edge of his vision.

Jonah felt the pressure immediately. Not pain at first. Something worse. Movement where there should never have been movement. He couldn't make sense of it.

Ada leaned closer, concentrating on whatever her hands were doing. Pressure became pulling. A sharp cut somewhere deep inside him. Then heat, sudden and vicious, before everything dulled again beneath the greater agony already consuming his body.

Jonah stared at the blood drying along her temple.

Another pull.

Another cut.

His thoughts drifted strangely between them.

Then Ada's hand came back into view. Something wet and dark lay cradled in her palm.

Jonah's eyes fixed on it. For several seconds his mind refused to understand what he was seeing. Ada lowered her hand over the bucket. The thing fell from her fingers.

Jonah's breath caught. It had been inside him.

She had taken something out of him—and thrown it away.

His eyes flew back to Ada. She was already reaching inside him again.

After that, time stopped meaning much. There was pain. Pressure. The shears. Heat that burned white through everything else. The soft, wet sounds Jonah tried desperately not to understand.

And the bucket.

Always the bucket.

Somewhere in the middle of it, Jonah became convinced he had died.

This was hell—it had to be.

When he and Marshall were boys, their father had kept pigs. Jonah had raised one almost entirely himself one summer, feeding her every morning before school, scratching the coarse hair behind her ears until she'd flop happily against the fence.

Then autumn came. Their father said the boys were old enough to learn where meat came from.

Jonah hadn't eaten pork for months afterward.

Now those sounds came back to him. The awful familiarity of them. He remembered standing beside Marshall with his sleeves rolled past his elbows. Remembered warmth against his hands. Remembered being told where to reach, what to take out, what went into the pail and what stayed.

Except now Jonah was the animal on the table.

His thoughts broke apart.

Sometimes there was only pain. Sometimes the rafters above him. Sometimes the blood drying dark against Ada's temple. Whenever he could bear to move his eyes toward her, she was still there. Brow furrowed in concentration. Hands steady. Never rushing. Never hacking blindly into him.

Taking her time.

Taking him apart.

Jonah stopped trying to understand what she removed. He stopped looking toward the bucket.

He wished she would make a mistake.

He wished her hand would slip.

He wished whatever impossible thing was keeping him alive would finally fail.

More than anything, Jonah wished Ada would just let him die.

###

The first handful scratched.

Jonah didn't understand the sensation at first. Something dry pressed into him, coarse little edges catching and dragging somewhere impossibly deep. Ada's hand withdrew. The pressure eased.

Then she reached into the barrel beside her.

Straw filled it nearly to the rim, chopped short and mixed through with dried monkshood. Jonah watched purple flowers and crumbling leaves disappear between her fingers as she gathered another handful.

Ada pressed it into him and the scratching returned.

Not like the blinding agony from before. Nothing close. This was smaller. Insidious. A thousand tiny points prickling against places that had never been meant to feel anything touch them.

Jonah couldn't recoil.

Couldn't scratch.

Couldn't do anything but feel it.

Ada packed another handful carefully into place.

She was humming. Jonah hadn't noticed when she'd started. The melody threaded quietly through the barn, almost lost beneath the rustle of straw.

He knew that song.

His next breath shifted something inside him. Dry stalks dragged against him from within.

Ada had pulled him onto the dance floor while that song played. He remembered her arms around his neck. Her cheek against his shoulder. The warmth of her body tucked against his while she laughed at something he'd whispered into her hair.

Ada hummed the next few notes.

The itch moved deeper.

Jonah's eyes filled with tears.

Ada reached into the barrel one last time.

This handful was larger than the others. She pressed it into him, then leaned her weight behind her hands and forced it deeper. Straw compressed against straw. Brittle stalks scraped and shifted inside him until Jonah's vision blurred, the maddening itch sharpening beneath the relentless pressure.

Ada pushed once more—hard. Then her hands withdrew.

"There." She sounded quietly satisfied. "That's enough."

Jonah lay perfectly still, filled with straw and monkshood, and felt every breath disturb what she'd packed inside him.

Ada planted both hands against either side of his opened ribcage.

Then she heaved.

The pressure was enormous. Everything she'd forced inside him compressed as his ribs reluctantly folded back toward their proper shape, straw grinding and shifting beneath the weight of her hands. Something deep inside gave with a sickening jolt.

Ada grunted with the effort and leaned more of her weight into him.

Jonah's vision went white.

A low grinding came from inside him, punctuated by small, brittle fractures as his ruined ribs were forced inward. Beneath it came the dry crush of straw and the softer, wetter sounds of his body compressing around it. "Mother made this look easier." Ada shifted her footing and bore down harder. "Suppose she had more practice."

Jonah's thoughts snagged on the words.

Mother.

Ada gave one final shove and something inside him gave. The barn swam slowly back into view. Ada was still bent over him, breathing hard, one forearm braced firmly across his ribs to hold everything in place while she reached across the table with her free hand.

Her fingers closed around the needle.

The first puncture burned. Jonah felt the point bite through his skin, felt the brief resistance before it broke through. Then came the thread. It dragged after the needle in a long, coarse pull, tightening until the edges of the wound drew together. Ada tugged the stitch snug and moved a little lower.

Another puncture, another slow drag, another tightening pull.

Jonah's tears slipped silently into his hair.

Ada worked steadily downward, closing him inch by inch. Every pass announced itself twice: first the sharp bite of the needle, then that awful crawling sensation as the thread followed through.

By the time she reached the last stitch, Jonah knew exactly what was coming.

Ada pulled it tight and tied it off. Then she ran one fingertip thoughtfully along the finished seam. "There," she murmured. "Much better."

She stood and crossed to the other workbench. The gloves came first. Soft kidskin, pale and supple from use. Ada drew them carefully over her hands, working each finger snug before reaching for a dark glass bottle.

Jonah knew what it was before she opened it. Monkshood. The smell reached him almost immediately, bitter and green beneath something faintly floral. "This will help." Ada poured a little of the oil into her palm and rubbed her gloved hands together.

Then she cupped his face. Jonah felt the first slick stroke across his forehead. Her thumbs worked slowly outward toward his temples before sweeping down over his cheeks, spreading the oil in careful, even passes.

One thumb brushed across his eyelid. Jonah blinked instinctively.

Ada did it again, massaging the oil gently over the delicate skin around one eye, then the other. Her fingertips traced beneath them, along his temples, across his brow.

"There." Ada smoothed her thumbs once more beneath them. "Isn't that better?"

Her hands travelled downward, working the oil beneath his jaw and along his throat before moving to his shoulders and arms. Her palms moved in long, firm strokes, thumbs pressing into muscle as though she were giving him a massage after a hard day's work.

Jonah stared at the blood dried along her temple.

Ada smiled and continued. "Great-Grandmother tried someone from away once." She worked more oil across his chest, carefully avoiding the fresh seam. "A transient fellow. Nobody knew him, nobody missed him. She thought that would make things easier." Her mouth twisted. "Terrible harvest."

She reached for more oil.

"He didn't know the land. Didn't care about it. Great-Grandmother always said afterward that should've been obvious." Her hands moved over his stomach, methodical and almost soothing.

"Aunt Ruthie went the other direction. Used her husband." Ada's mouth tightened slightly. "Awful man. Mean when he drank, meaner when he didn't. Ruthie finally decided she'd had enough."

Jonah watched her.

"She took a few liberties with the preparation." Ada glanced down his body, amusement briefly warming her expression. "Removed one thing in particular she thought he'd made poor use of."

Jonah understood.

Fresh horror crawled through him.

"Don't worry." Ada's smile turned teasing, almost indecently familiar. "I think I'll keep yours."

Her touch lingered.

Jonah could still feel her. Worse, after a moment, he realized his body could still react to her too. His thoughts went cold. He couldn't move a finger. Couldn't turn his head. Couldn't speak. But that still worked.

Ada felt the change beneath her hand. Her eyebrows lifted. Then her gaze traveled slowly down his body before returning to his face, a small, pleased smile forming at the corner of her mouth. "Well," she murmured. "Good to know."

Then her hand moved on.

"Turns out anger isn't any better," she continued, returning casually to her work. "That field struggled for years."

The oil left a faint sheen across Jonah's skin. Wherever Ada finished, the lingering prickles of sensation seemed to dull, his body sinking fractionally farther away from him.

"Thomas was different." Her voice softened. "He grew up three farms over. Worked this land with Dad for years."

Thomas. Jonah saw the scarecrow again. The battered hat. The crows perched along its shoulders.

"He lasted eleven years." Ada sounded proud of him. "Eleven harvests. Never had a bad one." Her hands slowed. "Until this year."

The crows. Jonah's eyes burned.

"I changed his stuffing every spring and autumn. Kept him oiled. Patched him when the weather got through." Ada looked down at Jonah with quiet affection. "I took very good care of him."

Something inside Jonah seemed to fall away. Ada reached up and brushed his hair from his forehead with the back of one gloved finger. "And I'll take care of you."

Jonah stared at her.

"I've been thinking about why Thomas worked when the others didn't." Her expression became thoughtful. "I don't think it's enough to know the land." Her palm settled over his chest. "You have to love it."

The words hurt somewhere the monkshood couldn't reach.

Ada knew.

She knew he'd refused to leave even after there was hardly anything left of the Reed farm. Knew he'd rather work somebody else's cattle than live somewhere without fields outside his window. Knew every road, every family, every fence line for miles.

She'd known exactly what she was choosing.

"You'll be wonderful." Ada's hand drifted away. For a moment she was quiet. Then she looked down at herself. Her gloved hand settled lightly against her stomach. Something changed in her face. Something almost shy. "Maybe you gave me something too."

Jonah's thoughts stopped.

Ada looked back at him. "Wouldn't that be something?" Her smile was small and wistful. "Maybe I'm not the last Mayfield after all." Her hand remained over her stomach for another moment. "And if not..." She glanced at him, that familiar little curve returning to her mouth. "Well. We have time."

He remembered the way she'd looked at him earlier. That small, pleased smile when his body betrayed him.

This wasn't the last time she would touch him.

The certainty of it was almost worse than fear.

"And if we're lucky..." Her fingers moved gently over her stomach. "You might even get to watch them grow up."

Jonah's eyes flooded.

"When they're old enough, I'll teach them. Just like Mother taught me." Her expression softened at the thought. "Some of my fondest memories are of helping her."

A child.

His child.

Standing over him in this barn.

Watching Ada open the stitches. Small hands passing her handfuls of straw and dried monkshood. Learning how tightly to pack him. How to thread the needle. How to stitch their father closed again when the work was done.

And someday doing it without Ada's help at all.

Ada leaned over and kissed his forehead.

"See?" Her voice was unbearably tender. "We'll take care of each other."

Ada straightened.

Ada disappeared into the barn again.

When she returned, she was carrying a neatly folded stack of clothes.

Jonah recognized the plaid first.

His eyes fixed on it.

Ada set the bundle beside him and shook out the faded shirt. "Let's get you decent."

The words landed somewhere distant.

Jonah had seen that shirt before.

Not this one. Another just like it, hanging loose from narrow shoulders while crows hopped along the arms.

The field.

Ada lifted Jonah's hand and began feeding his limp arm through the sleeve.

No.

She worked patiently, gathering the fabric and drawing it upward until his hand emerged from the cuff. Then she did the other side, lifting his shoulders from the table just enough to pull the shirt beneath him.

Jonah stared at the rafters.

Ada buttoned it over the long stitched seam down his chest.

One button.

Then another.

Then another.

"There."

She reached for the denim overalls.

Jonah wanted to close his eyes.

He couldn't.

Ada lifted his legs one at a time and worked the heavy denim over them, tugging the fabric higher until she could settle it around his waist. She fastened the suspenders over his shoulders, then paused to straighten one where it had twisted.

Her head tipped.

"Much better."

Boots came next.

Heavy. Scuffed. Familiar.

Ada wrestled each one over an uncooperative foot and tied the laces securely before reaching for the last things in the pile.

Leather work gloves.

She eased them over Jonah's hands finger by finger, carefully seating each useless fingertip inside its own.

Then she fastened the cuffs.

Ada stepped back.

For a moment, she simply looked at him.

Jonah didn't need a mirror.

He knew what she had made him look like.

Ada smiled.

"Now."

She turned away.

When she came back, she was carrying a heavy wooden post.

Ada returned carrying a heavy wooden post.

Jonah stared at it.

It was taller than she was, squared timber darkened by age and oil. A second beam had already been fixed across its upper third, forming a crude cross. Leather straps hung from it at intervals: broad ones along the upright, narrower ones at either end of the crosspiece.

For several seconds, Jonah couldn't understand what he was looking at.

Then Ada leaned it against the worktable beside him.

And he realized—it wasn't a support, it was a frame.

Ada reached for him.

She lifted one of Jonah's arms and laid it along the crossbeam. His hand hung uselessly beyond the timber while she wrapped a leather strap around his wrist and buckled it snug. Another went around his forearm.

Then she crossed to the other side.

Jonah watched helplessly as she did the same there, stretching his other arm along the beam until his body formed the same shape as the thing beneath him.

The scarecrow.

His breath caught.

Ada worked methodically downward. A broad strap crossed his chest beneath his arms, pinning him firmly against the upright. Another cinched around his waist. Then his thighs. His ankles.

Each buckle drew him closer to the wood.

By the time she finished, Jonah could no longer tell where his helplessness ended and the post began.

Ada stepped back.

Her head tipped slightly as she inspected him.

Then she smiled.

"Nearly finished."

Ada wheeled a low wooden cart alongside the worktable and locked its wheels with her boot.

Getting Jonah and the post onto it proved considerably less graceful. She wrestled the heavy end of the post across first, then took him beneath the shoulders and dragged the rest of him after it, stopping twice to catch her breath before finally arranging him flat along the cart.

"There," she panted. "God, you're heavy."

Ada pulled the cart through the barn doors.

Cold struck Jonah's bare skin.

After the close warmth of the barn it felt vicious, autumn air sweeping over every inch of him while the sudden darkness swallowed everything beyond Ada's silhouette. His eyes struggled after hours beneath the amber lights until the full moon overhead slowly resolved from a white blur.

The cart hit a rut.

The jolt travelled through wood and straight into Jonah. His vision flashed and the rafters he'd been staring at all night were replaced by a wheeling scatter of stars.

Another bump.

He couldn't brace for it. Couldn't tense. Couldn't even draw his limbs closer against the cold.

Ada kept pulling him toward the field.

The hole was already waiting.

A ladder lay in the grass beside it.

Ada manoeuvred the cart into place, climbed down into the shallow depression and wrestled the squared end of the post over its edge. For several minutes there was nothing graceful about it: boots slipping in loose earth, wood scraping against wood, Ada breathing hard as she levered Jonah and the post upward inch by stubborn inch.

Then gravity took over.

The base dropped into the hole.

The post swung upright. Jonah's whole world lurched from stars to field in one nauseating sweep before settling with a heavy jolt.

His weight dropped with it.

The straps caught him all at once. Leather bit hard across his chest, waist and limbs as gravity dragged his body downward against the frame. His shoulders pulled beneath the straps securing his arms to the crossbeam. His boots hung uselessly above the churned earth, every pound of him suddenly held by leather and timber.

For one terrible second, Jonah thought something would give.

Nothing did.

Ada stood below him, hands on her hips, catching her breath. "Almost."

She crouched beside the base of the post and began kicking loose earth back into the hole. Once there was enough to hold it, she took up the shovel and packed the soil firmly around the timber, working her way around it until the post no longer shifted beneath Jonah's weight.

Then she straightened. Ada wiped her forehead with the back of one hand and looked up at him.

Jonah hung above the pumpkins with his arms stretched along the crossbeam.

Exactly where the old Keeper had stood.

Ada smiled. "Perfect."

She gave the post one last testing shove.

The timber rocked beneath Jonah.

Only slightly. Then it settled.

Ada nodded, satisfied.

Wind moved through the pumpkins around him, stirring the drying vines with a soft endless rustle. The full moon cast sent an almost fire-like glow through the field, illuminating the deep orange flesh all around him.

Somewhere beyond them stood his own farm. His house. His bed.

Home.

Jonah couldn't turn his head toward it.

Ada walked a slow circle around him, testing the straps and giving the post one last firm push. Apparently satisfied, she returned to the cart and picked up the last of her things.

The ladder. Her sewing kit.

And the folded square of burlap.

Ada dragged the ladder through the grass and planted it beside him.

She climbed until she was level with Jonah's face, then settled astride the top, perfectly comfortable despite the cold. The sewing kit rested open across one thigh. The folded burlap lay across the other.

For a moment she simply looked at him.

Then Ada leaned closer. "Oh, Jonah." Her gloved fingers brushed his hair back from his forehead.

She kissed him.

Slowly, deeply. The same way she had kissed him in the barn, before Jonah knew what her hands were capable of.

When she drew away, their faces remained only inches apart.

Ada smiled. "Last one."

Her hand dropped to the burlap in her lap. She shook it out, then pulled it over his head.

The world disappeared.

Coarse fabric scraped down Jonah's face, catching against his nose and lips before settling heavily around his neck. For several terrible seconds there was nothing but darkness and the smell of dust, old fibres and his own breath trapped hot against his skin.

Ada's hands moved over the outside of the sack. "Hold on."

She tugged it slightly to one side. Pale light appeared through a narrow slit. The sky beyond was no longer quite black. Another adjustment, and the second opening found his other eye. Her fingers pinched the burlap beside his temple and pulled it snug against his face. "There. Now you can see. Let's make sure it stays that way."

The old scarecrow came back to him. Those strange eyes beneath the burlap. The ones Jonah had never liked looking at for too long. He'd always thought they seemed to follow him when he passed the Mayfield field.

They had.

A tear slipped from the corner of his eye. Jonah tried to blink it away. His eyelid barely moved. Fear surged through him.

Ada noticed immediately. "Shh." She wiped the tear away with one gloved fingertip, soothing him with the same absent tenderness someone might offer a child with a scraped knee. "It's all right. That means the oil is working."

His eyelid dragged downward again. Slower this time.

Ada smiled. "Can't have you crying out here. Someone might worry." She smoothed the burlap around his eye. "And I couldn't cover them. That would be cruel."

Jonah stared at her through the narrow slit.

Ada opened the sewing kit and selected a curved needle.

Jonah watched her thread it.

He understood.

There was no fresh surge of panic this time. No frantic screaming inside his head. Something in him had gone terribly quiet.

Ada brought the needle toward his face.

Jonah didn't try to blink.

He couldn't have anyway.

The point settled against the skin beside his eye.

He waited.

The needle went through. A small, precise bite beside his eye.

Ada drew it back through the burlap and pulled the thread after it, tightening the rough fabric against his skin.

Then another.

And another.

She worked slowly around the opening, one careful stitch at a time. Jonah felt every puncture, every drag of thread, every tiny tightening as burlap became fastened to flesh.

Ada stayed close throughout.

Her face filled nearly everything he could see. Brow furrowed in concentration. Dark hair falling loose around her cheeks. That awful streak of dried blood still marking her temple.

Whenever Jonah's vision clouded, she paused.

"Shh. I've got you." Her thumb wiped gently beneath his eye.

Then the needle returned.

By the time Ada moved to his other eye, the burlap no longer shifted when the wind caught it. Jonah watched her through the opening she'd already finished.

Needle.

Thread.

Her face close to his.

The darkness behind her slowly thinning.

Ada pulled the final stitch snug and tied it off. Behind her, the eastern horizon had gone pale. She inspected the little circles she'd made around his eyes, turning his face gently toward the growing light. Her smile softened. "Beautiful."

Ada stayed with him while the sun came up.

Colour slowly returned to the fields. Grey became orange and green along the pumpkin patch, dew catching the light wherever Jonah could see through the narrow openings in the burlap.

Ada packed away her sewing things.

"There." She closed the little case. "All done."

Jonah stared out across the waking fields.

His arms stretched uselessly along the crossbeam. Straw scratched softly inside him with every impossible breath. Somewhere beneath the clothes, beneath the stitches and monkshood and everything Ada had made of him, his heart continued stubbornly beating.

Ada climbed down. She folded the ladder and gathered her things onto the cart, humming quietly to herself again. Then she looked up at him. "I'll come check on you this evening."

As though she were leaving him for work.

As though there would be an evening.

And another morning.

And another.

Years.

Ada seemed to remember something. "Oh. And don't worry about Bandit." She smiled up at him. "I'll look after him."

Something inside Jonah broke.

Bandit waiting in his stall, lifting his head at every sound from the road.

Bandit wondering why Jonah never came home.

Ada kissed two gloved fingers and pressed them lightly against his hip. "Take care of things for me." Then she turned toward the farmhouse.

Jonah watched her go. He couldn't call after her. Couldn't turn toward home. Couldn't even close his eyes against the strengthening sun.

So he watched the Mayfield fields wake. Wind moved through the rows beneath him. Somewhere far off, an engine started. A screen door slammed. Birds called from the trees.

Ordinary morning sounds, the world continuing without him.

A dark shape appeared against the brightening sky. Jonah's eyes found it.

A crow—it swept low over the field, wings spread wide as it approached.

For one terrible moment Jonah remembered Thomas.

But the crow saw him. Its wings snapped wide and it wheeled sharply away.

Jonah watched it disappear toward the trees.

The fields rustled beneath his outstretched arms.

Ada had been right.

He was going to make a wonderful scarecrow.